Decision on high school due soon

Boundaries could change if new campus not approved

Despite an abundance of empty classroom desks countywide, some Broward school officials are willing to pay a premium for land to build a new high school.

The asking price for the two sites under consideration is twice the appraised value. Yet some School Board members would rather build the campus than face the upheaval of redrawing boundaries for more than two dozen high schools.

The proposed school in southwest Broward, dubbed High School MMM for now, would cost about $125 million and hold about 1,700 students. Broward's existing high schools are now under-enrolled by about 7,000 students total.

"You talk about a two-by-four in the back of the head. That's what this is," said School Board member Bob Parks, who favors redrawing boundaries. "The data screams that you don't need it."

The problem: Most of the crowded schools are in southwest Broward, and most of the empty desks are in central and east Broward.

Changing boundaries at just a few schools makes "people go berserk," said board member Maureen Dinnen, who hasn't made up her mind but worries that waiting could drive up land costs.

A decision must be made soon. The state approved the new school when classrooms were bursting countywide. If the district does not buy the land and sign a construction contract by Oct. 31, the state must re-approve the campus. And such approval may be unlikely now, given Broward's empty classrooms, said Schools Superintendent Jim Notter.

The two parcels, according to district documents and officials:

* 30 acres at Southwest 36th Street and South Post Road in Weston owned by land developer Ron Bergeron, a reluctant seller in a city desperate for a new high school. Bergeron bought the property for $1 million in 2000. The school system appraisal price came in at $10 million, and a district committee recommended a maximum offer of $11.7 million. Bergeron wants $24 million. He could not be reached for comment despite three phone calls to his office. In the past, Bergeron said he wanted the property condemned so he wouldn't be taxed on the profits for three years.

* 32 acres at Southwest 26th Street and Flamingo Road in Davie owned by brothers Daniel, Troy and Wayne Weekley, eager sellers in a town vehemently opposed to the school partly because it takes land off the tax rolls. Though school officials won't say specifically what the appraisal price is, they say the asking price, $14.4 million, is about twice the appraised value. The Weekley brothers began buying the land little-by-little six years ago, with a goal of selling.

"There are not many 30-acre parcels left. That's why we were willing to invest our money into it," said Daniel Weekley, who along with his brothers owns Weekley Asphalt Paving, which does business with private developers and local governments, including Fort Lauderdale, Davie and the school district.

"If the School Board wants it, they can take it. If they don't, they don't. It will be developed into something."

High School MMM has been on the books since at least 2001. The new school was part of a $3.4 billion plan to add classrooms throughout Broward to meet the state's 2011 class-size amendment deadline. Broward has already added 192 new high school classrooms for about $38 million.

But enrollment started to slide in 2005-06, reflecting an overall dip in the county population. And now, many desks are empty.

"Nobody really predicted 55,800 people exiting," Superintendent James Notter said about Broward's overall two-year population decline to 1.76 million this year.

Most of the under-enrolled high schools, including seven that recently received new classrooms, are in central and eastern Broward. Blanche Ely, Dillard and Fort Lauderdale high schools, for example, were each under-enrolled by more than 800 students this school year.

There are, however, still high schools bursting at the seams. Most are in southwest Broward: Cypress Bay, Everglades, Flanagan and Miramar.

"There's a need for a school out here," said Byron Jaffe, a Weston parent and civic activist who has pushed for the new campus. The schools with space are not in places where they are needed, Jaffe said, and using them as a reason not to build MMM "is a weak excuse."

Some relief is coming thanks to pending boundary changes and West Broward High School, a new $120 million campus in Pembroke Pines opening this fall.

Money tight

Redrawing boundaries "has always been a short-term solution," said Jaffe, whose children next year will enter Cypress Bay in Weston - currently the largest high school in the nation, with about 5,500 students. "My intent in this whole process was never to [move] out all of these people from Cypress Bay but to get a new school."

Change boundary lines to ship those students to the under-enrolled schools, and "you could have World War III on your hands," said Dinnen, whose district covers Plantation and eastern Fort Lauderdale.